Auto pioneer Otto P. Graff to be honored with statue in Flint

GENESEE COUNTY, MI -- The next auto pioneer to be honored with a statue in Flint wasn't involved in the manufacture or design of cars but instead was in the business of selling them.

Otto P. Graff, who nearly 100 years ago founded what has become Michigan's oldest family-owned dealership, is expected to become the subject of the newest statue dedicated by the Back to the Bricks organization.

The county Board of Commissioners gave initial approval today, Oct. 30, to a lease agreement that will allow a bronze statue of Graff to be placed on property owned by the county at Court and Saginaw streets in downtown Flint -- once home to the company Graff started.

"He's a contemporary of (Louis) Chevrolet and (David) Buick. He just happened to be on the sales side of things," said Al Hatch, chairman of Back to the Bricks. "There evidence he knew all those guys and they knew him."

Graff used a loan from Citizens Banks to set up a business selling Ford Motor Co. vehicles in Flint in 1914, according to the Hank Graff Chevrolet Web site.

The Otto P. Graff Motor Sales company continued to grow before the Depression of 1929 wiped out everything, according to the company's online history, which credited Citizens Bank with helping Otto Graff "weather the financial storm that devastated the country."

The agreement between the county and Back to the Bricks allows for the Graff statue to be placed at Court and Saginaw, which is "remembered most as the original and longest continuous location of a dealership in the company's history," according to the lease agreement.

Jerry Preston, chairman of the Back to the Bricks Statue Committee, said tentative plans are to dedicate a statue to Charles Nash, a former president of Buick, at Bishop Airport in spring 2014, followed by the Graff dedication during next year's Back to the Bricks event.